From Tuesday's (3/14/95) New York Times, reproduced without
permission...
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SOME STATES TRYING TO STOP GAY MARRIAGES BEFORE THEY START
What lies at the heart of the notion of family?
By David W. Dunlap
A battle over the very definition of marriage, which began two
years ago in Hawaii, is spreading through Western states as
lawmakers hasten to foreclose any possible legalization of
homosexual matrimony.
Homosexual marriages are not now legally recognized anywhere in
the nation, but commitment ceremonies have become an increasingly
common feature of gay life.
Anticipating that Hawaii may one day sanction gay weddings, Utah
legislators voted overwhelmingly this month to deny recognition
to marriages performed elsewhere that do not conform to Utah law.
This would include same-sex unions.
On the same day, March 1, a bill rendering any same-sex marriage
"null and void" failed by one vote to get on the calendar of the
South Dakota Senate. It had already been approved by the state's
House of Representatives.
Two days later, a bill was introduced in the Alaska House by
Representative Norman Rokeberg, a Republican, to make it explicit
that "marriage is a civil contract entered into by one man and
one woman."
This legislative trend has alarmed gay and lesbian organizations.
"Radical-right legislators will attempt to block recognition of
marriages once we win them in the future," said Evan Wolfson,
senior staff attorney at the Lambda Legal Defense and Education
Fund, "and will prevent the American people from having a serious
discussion about the denial of marriage rights."
For opponents of same-sex marriages, however, there is nothing to
discuss and nothing radical about the proposition that the family
has a man and a woman at its nucleus. This traditional structure
cannot be expanded to embrace gay couples, they say.
"Marriage is the basis of family life, and families are central
to civilization," said Robert H. Knight, director of cultural
studies for the Family Research Council in Washington.
"The law doesn't discriminate against homosexuals," Mr. Knight
said. "It merely says that each sex must be represented in
marriage. Same-sex couples do not qualify. It might be called a
partnership, but if it's called marriage, it's a counterfeit
version. And counterfeit versions drive out the real thing.
"I don't see these movements as an expression of bigotry but as a
long-overdue recognition that gay rights enacted into law become
tyranny for those who favor traditional sexual morality."
What Mr. Knight sees as tyranny, many gay and lesbian organizers
see as a legitimate expansion of what family means. "We're
labeled as promiscuous," said Robert Bray, of the National Gay
and Lesbian Task Force, "but when we ask for recognition of our
long-term relationships, we're denied."
Chris Ryan, president of the Utah Log Cabin Club, a group of gay
Republicans, said, "All we want are the legal rights that go
along with marriage." He mentioned visiting a partner in the
hospital, inheriting property, providing insurance coverage,
filing a joint tax return and distributing assets in a divorce.
In 1993, the Hawaii Supreme Court ruled that a refusal to grant
marriage licenses to three same-sex couples presumptively
violated the State Constitution. It sent the case back to a
lower court.
That case is pending and, depending on the outcome, could pave
the way to legalized gay marriage.
Such a development would set off not only a social debate but
also a constitutional one, over the applicability of Article 4,
which says in part: "Full faith and credit shall be given in each
state to the public acts, records and judicial proceedings of
every other state."
Unless a state explicitly declares an exception, State
Representative Roger Hunt of South Dakota said, "it may be
obligated to give full faith and credit to a marriage entered
into by two people of the same gender in another state."
"I believe, by and large, that would be counter to what, in this
state, has been the sanctity of families for the last 100 years,"
said Mr. Hunt, a Brandon Republican who was the legislation's
main sponsor.
But Barry Wick, executive director of the South Dakota Gay,
Lesbian and Bisexual Federation, called the bill "patently
offensive to anyone who remembers the miscegenation laws of the
South that banned inter-racial marriage" as late as 1967.
Lynn D. Wardle, a law professor at Brigham Young University, said
the new Utah law was designed to close a loophole that might have
compelled local authorities to recognize marriages of gay or
lesbian couples -- including Utah residents -- who traveled to
Hawaii to be wed.
The law would also ban recognition of marriages performed in
other states or countries if they involved incest, bigamy or
minors under the age of 14.
A spokeswoman for Gov. Michael O. Leavitt of Utah, a Republican,
said Mr. Leavitt was likely to sign the bill when it reached his desk.